Reading Borges after Benjamin: Allegory, Afterlife, and the Writing of History
This book explores the relationship between time, life, and history in the work of Jorge Luis Borges and examines his work in relation to his contemporary, Walter Benjamin. By focusing on texts from the margins of the Borges canon-including the early poems on Buenos Aires, his biography of Argentina's minstrel poet Evaristo Carriego, the stories and translations from A Universal History of Infamy, as well as some of his renowned stories and essays-Kate Jenckes argues that Borges's writing...
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This book explores the relationship between time, life, and history in the work of Jorge Luis Borges and examines his work in relation to his contemporary, Walter Benjamin. By focusing on texts from the margins of the Borges canon-including the early poems on Buenos Aires, his biography of Argentina's minstrel poet Evaristo Carriego, the stories and translations from A Universal History of Infamy, as well as some of his renowned stories and essays-Kate Jenckes argues that Borges's writing performs an allegorical representation of history. Interspersed among the readings of Borges are careful and original readings of some of Benjamin's finest essays on the relationship between life, language, and history. Reading Borges in relationship to Benjamin draws out ethical and political implications from Borges's works that have been largely overlooked by his critics.About the Author:Kate Jenckes is Assistant Professor of Romance Languages and Literatures at the University of Michigan
Acknowledgments ixIntroduction xiAbbreviations xixOrigins and Orillas: History, City, and Death in the Early Poems 1Family Trees 2A Journey of No Return 4Borges and His (Own) Precursors 6Sepulchral Rhetoric 8Life Possessions 13Melancholic Fervor 17The Orillas 28Acts of Life 31Bios-Graphus: Evaristo Carriego and the Limits of the Written Subject 35The Fallible God of the "I" 37Life and Death 38The Other American Poet 41The Paradoxes of Biography 46Carriego Is (Not) Carriego 50Violence, Life, and Law 57"Generous" Duels 62Allegory, Ideology, Infamy: Allegories of History in Historia Universal de la Infamia 67"National" Allegory 68Ideology 70Two Moments of Allegory 72Infamy 78Magical Endings Et Cetera 92Reading History's Secrets in Benjamin and Borges 99Historical Idealism and the Materiality of Writing 100The Conquests of Time 104History's Secrets 107Possession or the "Weak Force" of Redemption 108Refuting Time 117Ego Sum 125Terrible Infinity 130Recurrent Imminence 131Reading, Writing, Mourning History 135Notes 139Works Cited 155Index 163
